Bart Bingham

no one has ever given me a large chunk of skin to "do whatever i want" on. ever. I appreciate all of my clients business and i verbally thank every one of them for getting tattooed by me. i am polite and do my best to give everyone a tattoo they'll love for as long as they have it. I draw every thing at the last minute because i can and because thats i like to work. when i'm drawing i make tons of mental notes about how im going to render thet final product(the tattoo). if i draw a tattoo a week in advance then by the time i sit down to do that tattoo all those mental notes are gone. I feel like it brings more creative energy to the tattoo. i like to think that when people get tattooed by me it is because they liked my work and are confident that i am going to give them a good tattoo and not because they are doing me a favor. and that they are paying me for a job well done and again not because they are doing me a favor. just like when i choose a hair stylist, dentist, doctor, mechanic, plumber or etc., etc. i pick them because they have the ability to to the job i want and i dont feel like im doing them a favor.

absolutely judge a book by it's cover... that's what it's there for

Kahlil is great, super nice dude and incredible tattooer. I am actually surprised at how few people know who he is when i mention him.

depends on who youre dealing with really... personally I draw EVERY tattoo the night before or the morning of the tattoo or sometimes i draw it on the client with markers when they get there as do a vast number of top notch tattooers that i know do as well. I've been drawing for 30 years and drawing for tattoos 5-7 days a week for 15+ years. so when it seems like i drew your tattoo in 15 minutes, really i drew it in 30 years and 15 minutes as Bob Ross would say. There are tattooers who can work on a simple design everyday for a week and have it suck and there are tattooers that can draw the most complex and large designs in 5 minutes and create an amazing tattoo. its all relative. like i said it really depends on who your working with. everyone works differently.

none of the people listed on the site work there.

i think myth busters proved that you can in fact polish a turd... but it's still a turd.

nice one. Nick's awesome. his name should be on the "tattooers who deserve recognition" thread for real.

i doubt it would work now a days. back in the 90's when i started there was no facebook. hell, there was no internet. or cellphones and digital cameras. it wasn't so unusual to not have a portfolio.

my horror story is that i never apprenticed or tattooed out of my house. i lied about having years of experience and got hired at a shop and started tattooing the general public for money in a shop my very first day. it was awful, i couldn't ask for help because i didnt want to give away that i didnt know what to do. i didnt use rubber bands for my first couple of tattoos and even when i started using them i didnt know why i just saw that everyone else was using them. my first tattoo was "ranch industry" written in 1 inch old english and it took me almost 5 hours. every tattoo i did was lined with a 3 but looked like it had been tripled lined with a 14 round because i kept going over the lines thickining them in an attempt to "clean" them up. when asked why i was doing the outlines so thick i claimed that i was also a graff artist and that that was the style.

poor Dan. he left and tried to distance himself from tattooing and persued music only to find himself playing and looking out on audiences packed full of tattooers that look just like him. dude cant get escape.

i just got tattooed 3 times back to back last week on my thighs because i'm trying to get it over with so i never have to get tattooed again. i personally will be happy when i'm done and can get no more.

Agreed. Marcus is spot on

thanks. I've had one 2 hr sitting since. i havent been counting the hours but i think its hover somewhere around 10 give or take. its going very quickly. here it is now.

Dan Martin of Houston TX. I used to work for him before i left Texas. he is a fantastic illustrator and he does really nice tattoos. He was the first Really good tattooer i worked with/for. I gained a lot from that experience and dont think i'd be the tattooer i am today with out it. and i am grateful. he is a member on this forum as well.

i cant find any title on the book other than "Kuniyoshi " "Kuniyoshi from the Arthur R. Miller Collection" is what its listed as on the website i just found it on. heres a link: Kuniyoshi Exhibition Catalogue

Pshakman, I do have that book you're talking about. thats where i got my info and my print from. i picked it up at the Japan society exibit. Poor wording on my part i didnt mean to convey that i had a lone art print so i couldnt begin to know what one would cost. I'm a poor typist and it was just less words to say "i have a print" than to type "i have a book with a print of this in side" sorry for the confusion.

thank you guys. I own just about every "how yo draw the head" book there is and im always looking for more . i'm always studying them and real faces when i can trying to grasp and understand as best i can. so thanks for letting me feel like it's paying off even a little bit.

totally agree Bill, what really amazed me was how small they are in real life. they're all so detailed i thought they were gonna be huge. amazing. josh you are most welcome.

there is another very similar print by kuniyoshi from 1851 of three drowned warriors and some heike crabs. also in the settzu provence but different river. among those three is the dude kyle mentioned Taira No Tomomori .

oh and yes it is Kuniyoshi. it was the last single sheet warrior print that he did that was not part of a series. it was published in 1843-44 although it is believed he drew it years earlier. i only know this because i visited the kuniyoshi exibit at the japanese cultural center not too long ago. and i have this print

Ghost of the drowned warrior Shimamura Danjo Takanori He was a retainer of warlord Hosokawa Takakuni. he was drowned in battle fighting to save his lord. according to legend the crabs in the region where he was drowned bear markings that resemble his features. refered to as heike crabs i believe. he drowned in the Nozato River. in the settzu provence

Ghost of the drowned warrior Shimamura Danjo Takanori

and another thing. you're an incredible illustrator/tattooer. get some photos on that profile of yours so

also i need to learn to type. so many typos